he was chief of staff at ntia from april 2009 to august 2011. he's worked in industry and law practice as well, and was a senior legal advisor to fcc chairman william kenard. we're glad to have him because he is a recent addition to the panel. it won't be reflected in the bios we have there but we're glad to have tom power here. we received late sunday night word that michael powell would be unable to attend because of an unavoidable last-minute schedule conflict. so we're delighted to have james assi here with us today who is executive vice president at ncta, the internet and television association. he is a second-most senior executive at ncta involved in all aspects of their work. prior to that he was a long-time member of the u.s. senate finance committee on commerce, science and transportation. most recently including serving as senior democratic counsel to the committee. he has worked in law practice as well and taught communications law as an adjunct faculty member of georgetown university law school. so welcome back, james. i would also l

in may of 2015 fcc took over that responsibility when congress stopped appropriating funds to ntia.so that is where we stand at the moment, sir. >> okay. we will be glad to work with you on that. i'm glad you brought that up. i'm sitting by senator capita, and we appreciate her leadership and working hard. >> we are glad to get broadband going everywhere. >> thank you. >> and first net is proven to be very, very successful. all 56 states and territories have signed up. we are launching the service. so far it seems on schedule and on budget. and some of that infrastructure can be used to facilitate broadband on a much broader basis. so we're doing what we can to within the fiscal constraints to facilitate. >> again, hopefully we can help you with that and we appreciate that you realize the importance. one of the things that really brings it home, you travel in rural arkansas, rural west virginia, wherever, and you see young people sitting out, you know, on the bed of a pickup doing their homework, you know, in the evening or on the weekends simply because there is no connectivity the

using the spectrum and broadband through the ntia. there is concern at home and in states across the country that communities are not yet fully able to access broadband because they live in either underserved or unserved areas. i will be interested to hear how the department is currently working to address this problem and how 2019 budget will further support and understand where broadband access is lacking. additionally i want to know how nti is using what the subcommittee provided in 2018 to present the ability map and how you are coordinating with the federal communications division. i just this week met with chairman pie on the topic of maps and broadband and other technology deployments across rural america. effective deployment of broadband resources is completely dependent upon having the right data that identify those underserved or those that are not served. you working on tariffs, as well as affirming a preliminary anti-dumping duty on uncoated ground, wood paper. from the subcommittee's standpoint, i would like to hear what

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accuracy, connect the health rule with a map overlaying opioid drug abuse with access, and coordinate ntia, 7.5 million infrastructure fund for broadband mapping. we're tasked with writing reports for congress on variety of topics n our budget request we're asking for $8.5 million one-time information technology or i.t. investments this subcommittee supported critical i.t. upgrades. i want to thanks senator moran in particular for his legislative work on improving the federal government i.t. capabilities. many of our i.t. systems and applications are quite old. it is becoming harder to keep them running. we're seeking funding to shift from outdated legacy systems and applications to cloud-based solutions. taking the step will save money in the long run. it will improve resiliency. will reduce cybersecurity vulnerabilities it will enhance services we provide to those we regulate and to the american people. these i too. invests are main reason why we're requesting a slight bump appropriations for our regular operations in fiscal year 2019 from 32 it million dollars, to $333 million. but even

and obviously this is something within the department of commerce, ntia is taking a close look at. tt challenge for satellite is obviously it's typically global operation. even on things like 5 g and terrestrial, there are a lot of things to harmonize really for the convenience of people moving around. but you can put in different chips and operate different bands sort of globally. for satellite your challenge is that you are typically sending much weaker signal from space, and as we get smaller and smaller devices and power levels, if you are going to utilize that, you do have to have global coordination. it's not possible, and would frankly be a huge impediment to business if people had to go country by country to get authorization. whereas in terrestrial communications world, at least to this day, things are still done much more on a country by country basis. so it's not -- the companies typically operate more in that kind of footprint. so i think there is a distinction, and that's recognized in u.s. law, yes, we don't auction spectrum. we do auction the terrestrial spectrum. di